


Unbound

by Bullfinch



Category: Dragon Age II
Genre: Blood Magic, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-23
Updated: 2015-07-28
Packaged: 2018-04-10 20:25:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,857
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4406306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bullfinch/pseuds/Bullfinch
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>During Best Served Cold, blood mages kidnap Fenris to draw Hawke out. At the Wounded Coast, Fenris wakes, realizes what’s been done to him, and goes berserk. Hawke must rein him in before he gets himself killed.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A/N: A slightly revised version of Best Served Cold, in which a) the cul-de-sac in which the confrontation takes place is not actually a dead end, and b) no one trusted Samson enough to let him in on the whole secret meeting thing.  
> Fenris and Hawke have not been together very long at this point. Few weeks maximum.  
> I don't have a good excuse for this story. Not even close. But I wrote it anyway so here you go!

Cold.

Cold through his clothes, cold and firm beneath him, cold and grainy against his cheek.

Fenris’s eyes flutter open. His lyrium is alight with a faint glow, scouring away the sleepiness. White sand in front of him, a grey sky above. A group of people. Dimly the sounds of conversation resolve from the quiet roaring in his ears. A man’s voice.  _“…must let him go.”_ Then a woman.  _“No. The elf dies, right here.”_

_“Get away from him.”_

Calm as the pools that ring the Argent Spire. That’s Hawke.

Fenris remembers.

_“Shit! Is that—lyrium?!” The air misted red between them, her teeth gritted with effort. “Help me, I can’t hold him alone!”_

_Fenris roared in rage, the lustrous blood draping itself over his arms, enfolding them like thick swathes of silk. And his markings blazing, burning away the vile magic, only to be smothered once more by a second spell, from another mage, and a third. He would not be held again. Would not be bound. Would not. Would not._

_“Put him out!” the woman shouted. “Put him out, put him out now!”_

_Blood surging up his neck, flowing over his face like a caress. When he bellowed a curse at them it flooded his mouth, warm and thick, and he choked on it, coughed it up, spat it out even as he buckled, his vision sifting to nothing in slow pulses of red…_

A frightened squawk. “I—I think he’s waking up!”

Wrong. He is awake.

He’s on his feet in a spray of sand, the roar of fury already tearing itself out of his throat. Who is nearest? Whom can he kill first? A young woman, frantic, slitting open her arm for raw material. Blood mages. They’re all blood mages. He jams his arm into her chest, the lyrium snapping back almost as soon as he’s done it, and she makes a choked noise as her flesh opens up around him. Good. Her face contorts, the scream at last heaving out of her before it lurches abruptly into a gurgle. Good. He rips his arm out, gore splattering over the front of his shirt. Where is the next? Where is the next one he can gut?

He spins around.  _“I will kill all of you!”_

There is fighting.

Hawke. Hawke is here, briefly, before vanishing into the shadows. Aveline is here. And behind her, Anders, his casting interrupted when a whorl of enchanted blood rises around him and he cries out in pain.

Then a templar—a templar?—swings at Fenris, and he is fighting.

They took him from his home, and he is not in armor. It does not matter. He needs only to do damage. The lyrium radiates power, and he reaches into the templar’s chest. The man’s blade still falls. Pain. It does not matter. He closes his grip around the soft, pulsing mass of a beating heart.

He crushes it, the thick muscle bulging through his fingers.

The templar goes rigid, then convulses, wrenching himself off of Fenris’s arm. Good. Another dead. Not a blood mage, but complicit. One of them is running away. No. They cannot be allowed to escape. Fenris marches forward. A wave of blood lashes over his back, and he can feel the wounds opening, how his skin breaks, the muscle splitting beneath it. It does not matter.

A templar blocks his way. Fine. Another one to kill.

The woman’s sword chops down. Fenris doesn’t realize he’s dodging until his limbs are already moving for the counter. His unarmed forms, ingrained in him over years of training in Tevinter, now rising to his aid. He grasps her wrist, jamming the heel of his palm into her elbow. But her armor is well-made, and his strike is not strong enough to jar her hand open. Instead she sidesteps straight into him, shoving him back. Then the pommel of her sword opens up his cheek, and he stumbles, dazed. A sword-slash that he barely ducks, followed up by her shield bashing him in the face.

His teeth slice into the inside of his cheek. Blood bursts warm and thick over his tongue. As it did when that woman and her accomplices came into his house earlier and had the audacity to bind him—

— _his head spinning with the wine, his limbs pinned in place, his master standing over him with the whip—_

He surges forward, shouting at her in Tevinter, the most vicious and vile curses he knows, condemning her to the Black City, wishing her body to be ravaged by the Blight and her soul to be ruined by it until the end of all things. Shouts these obscenities even as she slumps to the ground, impaled upon both of his forearms, her face sprayed with his blood and spit.

Something hurts. His thigh. Cut deep. He turns. Blood mage, attacking. Another beside her. Fenris strides forward, through the red haze surrounding the woman, and kills her. Blood sprays onto his face and chest. Turns to the boy and kills him. Blood coats his arm, his fingers thick with gore. The haze makes him sick, and he staggers, nearly throws up. But the spell is gone now. A templar is there. Mace swings. Mace-head to his ribs. He buckles. Mace-head to his shoulder. Glancing blow. He reaches out. The man’s heart, soft,  _soft,_  so soft under all that armor. Fenris grins. Do they know? Do they know how easy this is? He squeezes. The rush of vengeance washes over him like a cool waterfall on a summer’s day, and he revels in it—

— _he is confused, his thoughts clumsy and slow, the taste of wine sour in his mouth. The whip hurts. Why? Why is this happening to him? “Please stop,” he says, and his master smiles as if amused—_

Blood spurting. Dead. Good. Now for the runaway. Gone down a sandy path, and Fenris pursues. The back of his shirt is wet. The winter wind cuts through it, plasters it to his skin. But his skin burns hot with the lyrium, and the cold is nothing right now. Nothing. He runs, his feet digging into the sand. He will not allow them to live. The path winds. He scans as he goes, behind every jutting rock, every squat bush and hardy tree. The blood mage will not escape him.

“Fenris!”

A scrap of cloth fluttering in the wind, but it’s only the remnant of a banner, snagged on a branch. He keeps moving. His hands are sticky, and his head pounds. It doesn’t matter. Killing them is the only thing that matters.

“Fenris, wait!”

Blood seeps from the cut in his cheek, fills his mouth. He spits it on the ground, feels it dripping off his lower lip. They hurt him, but they did not do enough. Made the fatal mistake of leaving him alive. They will pay for it. He will rip the debt from them with his own hands.

“Fenris,  _stop!"_

Something grabs his arm. He yanks it away and walks forward. Hawke. Hawke is beside him. “Fenris, please, you’re wounded, you need healing—“

“I need to kill them!” A vicious snarl, the words knotted and barbed tearing from between his lips. “They tried to bind me!”

“Listen, they’re dead, the fighting’s done!”

A light touch on his back, one he still jerks away from. “No! One of them escaped! He has to die!”

“Then I’ll find him, but you—Fenris, look at yourself—“

 _“I_  will find him! And I will  _crush his heart!”_  Fenris picks up his pace, the lyrium burning hotter now, as if being branded into him once more—

Hawke’s face, bloodied, broken with worry, sick with fear.  _“Please_ , you’re cut open in a dozen places, you  _need help!”_

“I do not need help, I can still fight!” He raises an arm to demonstrate, the bright glow of his markings overtaking his flesh. “I can still kill them!”

“You’re going to get  _yourself_  killed in the process!” Hawke keeps pace but does not try to touch him again. “I can take care of the last one, you have to trust me. Please, Fenris, if you die I—“

“Ser Hawke? Is that you?”

The runaway, stumbling out from behind a bush.

Fenris stops in his tracks.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry for all of this! I never wanted any of it to happen! I just want to go back to the Circle, I swear!” the young man pleads.

_—the whip again—why? Has he done something wrong? “I’m sorry,” he tries, but the whip flicks out once more. Desperate, he calls on the lyrium to free himself, but it cannot break through the soft press of magic around his limbs. Struggling wildly, still he remains immobilized, displayed—_

Fenris takes a step forward but Hawke is there in front of him, hands out. “Don’t do this, Fenris. Please.”

What is this? Hawke, protecting a blood mage? Fenris holds himself back, just barely. “He has to die! Out of my way, Hawke!”

But Hawke doesn’t move. “He’s surrendering! Let him go back to Kirkwall and face judgement there!”

Not good enough. “No! I have to kill him! Blood mages have to die!”Fenris roars.  _“I will kill every blood mage who did this to me!”_  He plants his hands on Hawke’s chest—

Next he knows he is being jostled.

His fingers drag in the sand, but then he rises, and his arms sway slightly as he moves. He is draped over…something. And this cloth against his cheek—

Carried. Hawke is carrying him, slung over one shoulder. He must have passed out. Fenris grasps Hawke’s shirt. “Did you kill the mage?”

“Fenris—shit—just try to stay still, you’re hurt—“

“I’ve told you, it does not matter! Did you kill him or not?”

“Doesn’t—of course it matters! You could have died!”

“I’m still alive, aren’t I?! Now did you—“

“Hawke!” Aveline’s voice. “Oh, no, Fenris—“

“It’s all right, he’s still with us.” Hawke strides through the strewn bodies, kneels and lets Fenris down carefully, sits him against a rock. “Anders, how are you doing?”

“All things considered, terribly.” The mage is pale, his robes stained dark red. “But it’s all right, I can help.” He approaches, reaching out—

Fenris smacks him away and crawls back across the sand.  _“Get your hands off me!”_

They all freeze, Anders holding the hand that Fenris has just struck. But the truth of the matter makes its way through the high, furious tongues of anger. Anders is not a blood mage. Only a healer, and only trying to help. Fenris puts together a halting apology. “I—am sorry. It’s just—I would prefer not to receive magical healing right now.” Doesn’t want to feel it again, the brush of magic on his skin, like ghostly fingers he can’t stop, or fight, or escape from—

Anders hesitates, but plunges on. “If I don’t help you right now, you’re not going to make it back to Kirkwall. This is a matter of life and death.  _Your_  life and death.”

“Please, Fenris.” Hawke grasps his knee.  _“Please.”_

This has all happened too fast. But he trusts Hawke, if not the mage, so he nods and forces himself to be still.

Anders comes closer and lays a hand on his shoulder.

Fenris tenses, unable to relax, every fraction of effort he has left occupied with staying here, not shoving the mage away and fleeing across the sand. The familiar sensation of magic trickling over him—he squeezes his eyes shut. This is necessary. He must let it touch him—

A sharp intake of breath. “Shit.”

Hawke’s voice. “Anders? What is it?”

“His markings. They’re—fighting me. No, I—I can still do it. I  _can.”_

Fenris trembles, or maybe shivers. The wind off the sea is cold, piercing through his wet clothes. Stay still. Do not run. Do not fight. His skin burns, the lyrium sparking, restless like a wild dog pacing, waiting only for its tether to fray just a little more. No. Stay still. Do not run. Do not fight. The brush of magic begins to sink deeper, staining into his flesh—

_—flesh splitting under the whip, and he screams, writhes against his unbreakable bonds. “Please help me!” he cries. “I can’t move!” Another lash, and another. His master’s smile grows wider. He is confused, unmoored in a black sea of terror, drowning in it. “Please help me!” he begs again. “Don’t hurt me! I can’t move!”_

The tether snaps. The lyrium lunges, snarling, its teeth eager and sharp. There’s a shout—the mage’s? His own? He isn’t sure. His body is numb. The cold? Maybe. He feels cold. His vision is blue and white. He waits for it to return to what it was.

But it fades to black first.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: This is first-draft quality at best but I have no patience so...I'm posting it. Apologies in advance.  
> Additionally, I go back and forth on whether or not I like Anders, and right now he’s sitting in the “like” category so, uh, that’s why there’s a large and unexpected Tragic Anders Moment. Hope it’s not too distracting, I know strong opinions abound. (This is in Act 3, for clarity.)

“Hawke?”

He blinks awake.

For a moment Hawke wants to stay just as he is. To not move, to lie here with his injuries, to let the world go on without him. Where has fighting gotten him? Hurt and exhausted, that’s where.

“Hawke? Can you hear me?”

A tremorous voice. Anders. Whom he is currently on top of. Right. Hawke pushes himself up on his hands. “Sorry,” he mutters.

“No, you—“ Anders sits up gingerly. “You…shielded me. How did you know? That he was going to do that?”

How? Because he knows Fenris. Knows what he looks like when he’s only just in control, and what he looks like when the fear’s broken through. And when Hawke saw that fear he threw himself over Anders and let the force of the lyrium blast smash into his back with the power of a dragon’s tail— “Instinct, I suppose.” Hawke shrugs, locking down the urge to wince. They already know he’s injured. They can’t know how badly. “Were you hurt? Aveline?”

Anders shakes his head, and Aveline limps over. “Just twisted my ankle, that’s all,” she says.

Fenris is lying in the center of a shallow crater. The sand around him is soaked with blood, both from the fight earlier and from his own wounds. Hawke stares, frozen, his chest growing tight. For all his tricks, his quick blades, his deft hands, his silver tongue, he’s completely useless here, when Fenris needs help the most.

Anders crawls closer. “I—I haven’t fixed him yet. I have to try again.”

Hawke kneels beside him, should the lyrium flare to life again. But it remains dead, as Anders’s moon-white healing magic flickers from his hands. His face is drawn, eyes squeezed shut, and his arms shake with effort. He and Fenris aren’t at each other’s throats so much recently—these days Anders wanders about like a ghost half the time, and he still puts in his jibes when the occasion presents itself, but they’ve started to sound like a reflex and no more. Fenris, of course, snaps right back, but most of his anger comes from the frustration of knowing Anders’s barbs are empty and not understanding why the man keeps lobbing them anyway.

But now, Anders bent over Fenris’s bleeding body, grasping his own wrist to steady his hand, a whimper ghosting out from between his gritted teeth—this desperation is not something Hawke’s seen before. Perhaps because things have never been this bad, but that doesn’t quite explain Anders’s intense desire to save the life of one of his least favorite people.

Then suddenly he starts swaying like he’s on the deck of a ship, and Hawke lunges forward and grabs him. “Are you all right?!”

Anders clutches Hawke’s sleeve and nods. “Yes, fine. I’m fine. He’ll live.”

“How about you? I saw you get hurt during the fight.”

“I know, it’s all right. It’s not that bad.”

Aveline heaves a sigh. “It’s no use, I’ve already tried asking.”

Anders pushes himself off Hawke brusquely. “I told you, I’m all right. Nothing a day or two of rest won’t fix.”

A dubious assertion—Anders looks like a man hollowed of life, little more than an animated corpse. And especially vulnerable, too; perhaps because he’s exhausted of magic, and it’s somehow apparent in the sheen of his skin, or the way he holds himself. Hawke doesn’t press. That approach has historically had the opposite of the desired effect. Instead he mutters, “As long as you’re sure.”

Then he turns his attention to Fenris.

“Be careful with him,” Anders puts in. “He’s…still very fragile. I’m sorry, I wish I could have helped more, but I was…”

“Drained keeping me on my feet. I’d be dead three times over if it weren’t for you.” Aveline offers him a hand. “Thank you.”

Anders hesitates, then takes it.

Hawke sits Fenris up, brushes the sand off his clothes. It sticks to the patches of drying blood. He’s covered in it. Hawke kisses his bloodied face, as if that’ll help.  _We’re alive,_  he reminds himself.  _We’re all still alive_.

“Listen, Hawke…” Aveline’s testing her twisted ankle, and she grimaces. “Are you well enough to carry him back? If you’re not, I can try, but…the going will be slow. And we’re not up to fighting anyone else right now.”

Hawke doesn’t say anything for a moment. Is he well enough? He decides to avoid answering that question, as he did when Fenris was asking whether or not he killed the mage. Instead he replies to the relevant bit. “I can do it.”

So he picks Fenris up—in his arms this time rather than over his shoulder, a gentler carry. It’s not particularly easy. Fenris is heavy for such a slight person. All that greatsword-swinging, no doubt. By the time they get back to Kirkwall Hawke doesn’t think he’ll be able to lift a teaspoon.

They begin to march.

Aveline goes in front, clutching a gnarled branch as a walking stick, her limp pronounced but her pace steady. She’s the only one of them in any shape to beat back attackers. She and Anders probably think Hawke could help. He reconsiders his plan to conceal what kind of shape he’s in. If they think they can depend on him, they might end up making mistakes.

Hawke decides against saying anything. He’ll cross that bridge when he comes to it.

It didn’t take long for his opponents to figure out that his weapon was his speed. Grace was the one who acted on it, thick curtains of blood wrapping around his trunk and his limbs. He never let her pin him down completely, but the swathes of magic blocked his vision, got in his way, and made him an easy target. Other mages fired spells at him, nasty grasping claws that passed through his armor as if it weren’t even there. A templar with a warhammer came at him, too, and his dodges were too slow, too hampered by Grace’s damned magic. Blows that should have been glancing hit with full force. He couldn’t even get to her to break the spell.

And then Anders killed her with a blossom of fire, and Hawke was free to move again.

As he walks, he goes over the list.

With dodging removed from his array of options, he had to block instead. That warhammer would have cracked his skull open. His right arm took the brunt of it, and it’s not working all that well anymore—he can still hold Fenris, but his fingers are weak and curled, and it was hard to keep a grip on his dagger during the fight. The templar also got in a shot or two at his ribs. Maybe more than two. His armor protected him. A little.

He sighs. What’s the point in talking around it when this is all inside his own head? The ribs are broken. There.

The claws of blood raked over his shoulder and back—he hunched to protect his gut. Gut wounds are bad, and tough for Anders to heal. The broad blots of red don’t show so much on the dark leather of his armor, and he tightened the straps after to staunch the blood flow. One reaching set of claws nearly closed around his neck, but he twisted away just in time. Instead it sliced his face, and half his beard is soaked in blood.

All in all, it’s more likely than not that he’ll make it back to Kirkwall.

Anders shuffles along beside him like one already dead, stumbling toward an afterlife that glows far off, resting perpetually on the liminal border of the horizon. The pangs of sympathetic pain reverberate through Hawke, as powerful and as useless as ever, but he tries anyway. “Anders, you should come back to the estate. You’ll rest better there than you will in Darktown.”

Anders’s gaze flicks up, and Hawke sees the immutable defeat, knows already it won’t work. But the resignation sharpens into bitterness. “What, so I can be on hand to heal your boyfriend as soon as I’m feeling a little better? Generous, Hawke, but I think I’ll head home, thank you.”

Hawke’s jaw falls open. That’s nasty, even for Anders, and he splutters out a denial even though it’s an obvious ploy. “That’s—that’s not why! Hightown is much safer than your clinic!”

“Hm.” Anders gazes ahead, the bitterness attenuating to nothing, as if he lacks even the energy to sustain it. “As I said, I think I’ll head home.”

Aveline’s looking over her shoulder, and she shakes her head at Hawke, annoyed. It appears she’s had enough of Anders for the day.

Hawke wants to help. Badly, and it hurts to leave things like this, but he  _can’t_  help. He’s tried and tried, and all he ever sees is a few moments of happiness, of the old Anders shining through, before the defeat buries him again. Still, Anders has just saved Fenris’s life—saved all their lives—and Hawke makes one last effort. “Anders…”

“No.” His voice trembles. “All right? Don’t make me say it again.”

Hawke falls silent. He doesn’t have the energy to push any harder. Barely has the energy to stagger forward, to hold Fenris up. Once more he thinks of just stopping here, falling to his knees, letting everything else pass him by. No more fighting, no more struggles, no more disappointments or pain. Everything will go its own way.

But no. He’s fought demons, darkspawn, blood mages, and high dragons. And Fenris has fought at his side. Surely he carry the man he loves a few short miles back to the city. The winter wind blows off the sea, disturbing the skeletal trees, and he turns his back to it. Fenris is probably freezing, although it’s impossible to tell. He’s still asleep, not even shivering, just breathing quietly against Hawke’s chest. Hawke holds him closer. The going isn’t easy—they haven’t yet left the coast, and the white sand shifts under his feet as he walks.

The pain walks with him.

The steps, the shifting of his weight to keep his balance on the sand. The effort of carrying Fenris. Dully Hawke names the signals as they come.  _Ribs,_  he thinks, as he takes a step. Sharp pain. Broken bone.  _Back,_  as he curls slightly to keep Fenris close to him. Burning. Sliced flesh.  _Face_ , as the wind picks up grains of sand and flings them into the wide-open slices on his cheek. It’s bad. All of it. He knows what the pain means. Damage. He’s damaged. But there’s nothing to be done about it now.

At last the ground grows firmer, into the hard pack of dirt. They’re nearing the city.

Kirkwall’s gates have never been a more welcome sight, the high arch above them like a mothering arm, drawing them into a protective embrace. Darktown glowers off to their left, and Anders hesitates, standing stock-still in the middle of the street, as if reluctant to leave. But he does, lurching off into the disordered jumble of buildings.

The three of them draw stares as they go. Hawke can imagine why. They look like they’ve just been to the Deep Roads and back without stopping for a rest. Aveline’s the next to break off, and she gestures. “Come on. You’re both badly hurt, you need the Circle.”

“No,” Hawke tells her. “I can’t take Fenris there. He doesn’t want any Circle mages going near him. Doesn’t want them to get a look at his markings.”

Aveline opens her mouth to protest, then exhales through her teeth. “Fine. Then drop him off with a mundane healer and come to the Circle yourself.”

Hawke shakes his head. “I won’t leave him. I can’t.”

“Hawke, I’ve known you longer than anyone else in this city. When your injuries aren’t bad you own up to them. When they  _are_  bad, you don’t even mention it, or you brush it off and distract us with something else. Like you did today. You can’t pull the wool over my eyes, Hawke. You need  _help.”_

He hugs Fenris closer to him and shakes his head once more.

For a second he thinks Aveline’s going to throw them both over her shoulder and haul them to the Gallows, whether they like it or not. But she seems to slump a little, and turns. “Just—take care of him, will you? And take care of yourself.”

Then she’s off toward the docks.

Hawke gazes up the massive stone stairs to Hightown, as intimidating now as they were the first day he saw them. He starts up the steps.  _Ribs._  Passers-by gape at him, perhaps for his fame, more likely for all the blood.  _Back._  Fenris starts to slip from his grasp, and he shifts until they’re both stable again.  _Arm._

By the time he reaches the estate it’s well and truly dark. Without a hand free, he kicks the door until Bodahn appears. “I’m sorry, Master Hawke is—oh, ancestors have mercy, Master Hawke!”

“Please…” He makes it inside, staggering, all his strength gone. Hasn’t the faintest idea what’s keeping him upright at the moment. “Warm up some water. We’re both a bit—er—bloodied.”

“Of course! Oh, Ortan’s teeth, I’ll send for a healer, too.”

“Bodahn? A  _discreet_  healer, if you would.”

“Certainly, Master Hawke. Sandal!”

Good. Most of Hightown already knows they’re friends, and Hawke would rather the nobility not learn the truth of the matter. Fenris already has enough nasty things being said about him. Hawke trudges to the back of the house, into the broad, tiled bathroom, and, at last, lays Fenris down. His arms are seized up and numb, but they’re still somewhat functional, so he draws a knife from his belt and starts cutting Fenris’s ruined clothes away.

He was right. Fenris is freezing, his toes pale, his body covered in gooseflesh. Hawke leans down and kisses him. “I’m sorry,” he mumbles. “I’m sorry.”

The door creaks shut behind him, and when he turns there’s a bronze basin of hot water sitting on the floor, with a modest pile of towels. Bodahn’s a sneaky bastard. First Hawke wets one of the towels and wraps Fenris’s feet. If Fenris wakes short a few toes, he will no doubt be very displeased.

Then the rest.

Hawke soaks the towel and rubs it with soap. Needs to keep the wounds clean. He starts with Fenris’s leg, the cut up his thigh in a graceful curve. How was he walking on that? The dried blood tracks all the way down to his ankle. Hawke cleans it off, goes over the wound with the lightest of touches. Fragile, Anders said. The scab is thick, little bits flaking off even with all Hawke’s care. A few small blots of fresh, bright red appear. Damn it all. Terror twists his gut—what if Fenris starts bleeding again?—and he presses the soapy towel to the wound—

Fenris shudders, moans a little. Hawke leans closer, strokes his face. “Fenris?”

No answer. Perhaps just a reaction to the sting of soap on broken skin.

A mass of bruises over his left ribs, swollen and purple, stippled with dots of rusty dried blood. Hawke tries to be gentle, but still Fenris twitches in his sleep, his brow creasing in pain. Next, a messy chop just off his shoulder. The entire arm is covered in blood, although Hawke suspects most of it belongs to Fenris’s victims. There are some bits of gore here and there, streaked over his wrist or stuck between his fingers, congealed to jelly. Hawke saw him, jamming his hand into people’s chests, screaming curses at them. But most surprising was the lyrium. Hawke’s never seen it respond that quickly, Fenris’s arm flushing phantom blue-white and back to normal again within a second.

Now isn’t the time to worry about that. He sits Fenris up, recognizes on his back the razor-edge slices of an expert blood mage. The scabs aren’t so messy here, but under the coating of dried blood the flesh is pink and contracted. Deep wounds. If Anders weren’t there…

Hawke kisses Fenris’s shoulder, rubs the cloth over his skin. Still cold. At least the wounds won’t scar. Fenris never scars—something to do with the lyrium, he says. Hawke must admit to mild jealousy. His own body is covered in knotted evidence of his past mistakes.

He tries to lift Fenris once more only to fail, his arms simply too fatigued. Carried him all the way here from the Wounded Coast, only to be defeated by a hallway and a meager set of stairs. The fact seems unbearably hilarious right now, and he hunches, crushes a hand to his mouth to hold back the convulsions of laughter.

After a few deep breaths he tries again, and manages it this, time, straightening— _ribs_ —and heading down the hall.  _Arm._  Reaches the stairs. First step. Second.  _Back._  Third.

When he reaches the bedroom he lays Fenris down, his arms shuddering, muscles spasming with fatigue. He vaguely feels as if he’d like very much to fall into a dozen pieces and lie there on the floor, inanimate, never to be assembled again. But of course he cannot do that. So much depends on him. Fenris depends on him.

A knock at the door. “Master Hawke? The healer is here.”

Thank the Maker. “Send her in.”

She’s an older woman, her hair shorn close to her head. “Irene Tally,” she says curtly, and sticks out her hand.

Hawke shakes it. “Rowan Hawke. As, well, I’m sure you know already. Do you practice in Hightown? I’ve never heard of you before.”

“That is rather the point.” She sets her bag down. “I’ll need you to undress.”

“No.” He nods at the bed. “Take care of Fenris first.”

She lifts an eyebrow. “It looks like someone’s already healed him. Whereas you look as though you tightened your armor to staunch your wounds and haven’t let out the straps yet. Ser Hawke, I’ll need you to trust me. I have a great deal of experience in these matters.”

Hawke doesn’t move for a moment. He isn’t used to people disobeying him. But the momentary affront soon dissipates into an amused self-reproach. Fame is an insidious boon. “Fine.”

So he undoes the buckles, finds he can breathe again (funny how he hadn’t noticed how tight the leather plates were around his chest) and strips his shirt off, registering the sharp tear of pain— _back_ —as the cloth separates from the broken skin it was stuck to.

Irene goes around behind him. “Mm. Fought a blood mage, did you? Not a very skilled one.”

Hawke grins despite himself, surprised. “Great deal of experience indeed, Ser Tally.”

She cleans him up, sews and covers the wounds, and instructs him to drink plenty of water. It’s been a long time since he’s received stitches; normally Anders heals him, or a Circle mage, if Anders is exhausted. It seems such a luxury now, in this quiet room, with his back sliced open, his arm half-working at best, the man he loves having only just escaped death. There are times when he feels invincible. The hubris makes him grin again, without so much good humor this time.

The ribs Irene leaves alone—nothing to be done, she says—and his right arm she places in a sling. At last she moves on to Fenris, wrapping his wounds with plenty of padding. Not one inquiry about the tattoos, nor even a flicker of interest. A true professional. She leaves some herbs and salves, for pain, and to keep the wounds healing smoothly. As she walks out she tells Hawke to expect an invoice within the week, and not to bother tipping—her discretion is included in the fee.

He’s not especially fond of the sling, but he figures that re-injuring the arm will only slow the recovery process, so he keeps it as he rummages through the bureau. At first he tries to find the least expansive clothes he owns, then he decides Fenris is little more half his size and it’s really only a matter of degrees in just how much he’s swimming in whatever outfit Hawke picks for him.

So Hawke dresses Fenris with care, then stands back to evaluate his handiwork. Well, better too large than too small. Next he calls to Bodahn to bring a couple of pitchers of water and sits beside the bed, settling down to hold vigil.

Fenris sleeps as peacefully as he ever has.

Here in Hightown, the events of the day seem far, far away—the skeins of blood magic whirling through the air, the templars’ unyielding ferocity, and Fenris’s blind fury, curses tearing from his throat, his arms coated in dripping gore. Yet all that happened only a few hours ago. Fenris grievously wounded and running off down the coast in pursuit of that escapee—bellowing at Hawke, enraged, nearly ready to tear him down to get to the mage behind him—

Going limp all of a sudden, pitching forward right into Hawke’s arms.

Hawke doesn’t remember the last time he felt so terrified, so helpless, so inconsequential. He’d thought Fenris was dead. But no, his pulse still fluttered against the thin skin at his neck. Hawke rattled off a thousand prayers of thanks to the Maker as he turned and told Alain to return to the Gallows and give himself up.

And then hefted Fenris onto his shoulder— _ribs_ —and started stumbling back to where he’d left the others.

He doesn’t know what triggered that bloody savagery. Fenris might talk of it later. He never did much before, only opened up in rare moments when he’d find himself off-guard and Hawke was there to bear witness. But recently, since they’ve decided to be together, he’s started revealing more and more, as if relieved to finally let out the things that no one else knows, that were a private secret between him and Danarius.

Danarius, of course, is dead now. Maybe that has something to do with it. The way Fenris spoke of his old master, Hawke suspects that he’d half-feared Danarius would come back and, finding Fenris had divulged such secrets, punish him for opening his mouth.

The thought makes Hawke sick, as always, sick to his stomach. Anytime he thinks of what Fenris has been through, all he wants to do is go back, save him from it somehow. But of course that’s impossible. The damage is done. Fenris reassures Hawke that he’s happy now, that this new life is more than he ever expected to have. Yet his past is not something he’s left behind, but something he brought with him, a wicked passenger with little black claws dug into his back, snapping at his heels, whispering remembrances in his ear like the sweet nothings Hawke murmurs to him when they’re in bed together—

Hawke shivers, digging his fingers into his thigh. There’s nothing he can do about it. He’s accepted that already.

Or hasn’t, but it’s still true.

Now all he can do is stay right here. The last thing Fenris will remember when he wakes was whatever memory terrified him so much that it turned his markings on his allies. It’ll be best if the first thing he sees on regaining consciousness is a friendly face.

Even if that friendly face is a sleeping one. Hawke tries not to doze, but he’s completely exhausted. At least he has a tendency to list to the right, and the discomfort in his injured arm from getting squashed against the chair jerks him awake now and then. Each time he lurches forward, afraid Fenris has fled, like he has before. But no. He remains.

Hawke squints out the window. Still dark, although he thinks that might be the very first hints of sun, the sky grading to purple at the lower edges. Then he returns to watching Fenris again— _shit._  Fenris’s whole body is tensed, the fine, clean lines of muscle standing out against his skin. He’s having a nightmare. Hawke leans forward and grasps his wrist—

His green eyes fly open, and he snaps his wrist out of Hawke’s grip.

Shit. Fenris lunges forward, and Hawke blocks on instinct, batting a jab away before there’s an extremely uncomfortable sensation like half his stomach is missing and he would look down if Fenris’s hand were not locked around his throat. The other hand, of course, phased by the lyrium into Hawke’s body, no doubt a mere half-second away from crushing his heart— _that’s fine,_  he thinks, for some bizarre reason,  _as long as Fenris is awake it’s fine_ —

“Nn—“ Fenris jerks away, fortunately before he can squeeze Hawke’s heart to pulp. “No. I’m sorry.”

Hawke holds his middle. Andraste’s  _tits,_  that was strange. “It’s all right—“

Fenris backs away across the bed. “I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine, Fenris, I don’t—“ Hawke half-rises.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Hawke.” His body starts to tremble. After a second Hawke recognizes it. A panic attack.

He’s never seen Fenris have one before, but there was a girl in Lothering, one of his good friends, who had them now and then. Hawke lurches forward, then remembers that sometimes touch didn’t help, so he stutters out, “Can—can I—“

Fenris nods, hugging his knees.

So Hawke climbs onto the bed and embraces him. At last, one thing in this awful day he’s useful for. “It’s all right,” he murmurs, and kisses Fenris’s hair. “You’re safe.”

Fenris heaves in deep, quick breaths, shivers against Hawke’s body. He hides his face as if ashamed to show it, and Hawke rubs circles on his back, through the fine fabric of his too-large shirt. “Try to take slower breaths.”

Fenris lets his hands down, trapping his arm between them. His chest expands. Hawke kisses his hair.  _Ribs._  It doesn’t matter. Feels Fenris wrapping an arm around him, pulling him closer.  _Back._  Fenris turns into Hawke’s chest, and Hawke holds him tight, the sling slipping off.  _Arm._  It doesn’t matter. Fenris is awake. Fenris is all right.

Eventually his breathing slows, and they both relax. Hawke leans against the headboard, and Fenris rests against him, fingers balled in his shirt. “I…nearly killed you.”

“Oh, don’t worry about it,” Hawke says airily. “Not the first time someone’s nearly killed me. I’m just glad you’re alive. When you blacked out that first time and just—collapsed…”

“I—I don’t know what came over me. What that woman did to me, it—unburied a memory I thought I’d left far behind.” Fenris turns his face into Hawke’s chest. “That kind of rage…after all this time in Kirkwall—to think that’s still a part of me somewhere—“

Hawke hears the guilt, cuts in to staunch it. “Some wounds take a long time to heal, that’s all.”

“Yes. Well. Let us hope it heals quickly. Attempted murder is a poor way to show affection.”

Hawke grins. “It’s all right. I did choose this, Fenris. Chose  _you,_  warts and all.”

Fenris sits up, fixing Hawke with a baffled stare. “Warts?”

Ah. One of those Fereldan sayings that never quite made it up to the Marches. “No, it’s—it’s just an idiom! It means I love you even if you do try to kill me now and then.”

“I see.” Fenris settles down again, apparently satisfied. “Well, I will nonetheless endeavor to avoid doing so in the future.”

“That—is comforting to hear,” Hawke admits.

“May I ask what happened to the mage? He was trying to heal me—“

“You didn’t hurt him. Your lyrium exploded, but…” Hawke tries to figure out how to avoid saying—

“You took the blow for him, didn’t you?”

He sags, a recalcitrant child caught with red hands. “Yes. But I’ll be fine. As will you. He did manage to heal you, after you lost consciousness again.”

“Hm.” Fenris starts to heave a sigh, but breaks off halfway through, wincing. “I suppose I shall have to thank him.”

There is hope yet. “A few small words can go a long way,” Hawke offers.

Fenris grunts and falls silent. Hawke waits, sensing there’s something more he wants to say, and strokes his hair, the back of his neck. The silence is broken only by the crackle of flames in the fireplace.

At last Fenris speaks again. “Even when I was…a slave, Danarius could not truly shackle me. My markings would allow me to escape any bonds. I knew that as well as he did, and the only thing that kept me from freeing myself was my own self-restraint, my own fear of punishment. I suppose Danarius did not like ceding that last inch of control to me. So there were times when…he would force me to drink until I no longer knew where I was or what was happening. Then he’d pin me down with blood magic and—hurt me. I would be confused and afraid, and I’d try to escape, as I knew I always could, but even the lyrium could not break his spells. So he would hurt me, and watch me struggle, and that satisfied him.” Fenris shifts, stretching out his legs. “Funny how my devotion to him was not strong enough even to survive a few cups of wine. I should have noticed that earlier. But…it was those memories that drove me earlier, that…caused me to lose control of myself.”

Hawke nods. “I’m rather glad you killed him.”

“As am I.” Fenris tugs on Hawke’s shirt. “Lie down.”

So Hawke obeys, pulls Fenris on top of him— _ribs, ribs, ribs_ —drags Fenris to one side a little. “I’m also rather glad you didn’t die.”

“I apologize. I should not have let them take me in the first place. I shall be more careful in the future.”

“I doubt you  _let_  them take you. You don’t seem the type to go quietly.”

“Alas, there was little actual fighting. A good deal of shouting and cursing, yes.”

“Then I’m rather glad we don’t have to worry about them anymore. I…don’t know what I’d do if I lost you.”

Fenris leans up and kisses him. “You still have me. And you always will.”

——

When Bodahn knocks on the door a few hours later, Hawke finds that despite the injuries, he actually feels well-rested and in good spirits. Something he’s grown accustomed to these past weeks—sleeping beside the man he loves does wonders. “What is it?” he calls.

“Your friend is here.” Then, in a forced whisper intelligible even through the door,  _“The mage.”_

“Anders!” Hawke shakes Fenris gently. “Let’s go say hello.”

Fenris makes a noise of displeasure and rolls off of Hawke’s chest.

They’re trooping downstairs moments later, Hawke striding forward, Fenris lagging behind, his borrowed shirt (as expected) nearly reaching down to his knees. Anders is there in the hall, fidgeting with the seams on his robe. “How are you feeling?” he asks.

“Quite good, to be honest.” Hawke adjusts the sling a bit so it’s not cutting into his neck. “How about you?”

“I—well, I’ve been better, but not bad, considering.” He hesitates. “Listen—I’m sorry for what I said yesterday. It was petty and uncalled for, and I shouldn’t have—“

“You’re forgiven.” Hawke wraps his good arm around Anders and pulls him close.

“I—oh.” Anders returns the embrace, somewhat more tentatively. “Well—thank you.”

Fenris wanders back in from the kitchen and slams a tray of cups down on the table, making the porcelain rattle. “Tea?” he asks, in a tone that makes it clear he resents being forced to participate in this encounter at all.

Anders pokes his head out from Hawke’s bear hug. “I—no, thank you. I can’t stay.”

Hawke releases him at last. “Are you sure? Just a few minutes. Just one cup of tea.”

He puts on his most pitiable pleading face. It works—even Fenris isn’t completely immune—and Anders relents. “All right. One cup.”

Hawke embraces him again.

When he steps back Fenris is holding out the saucer, gazing carefully at the floor. “I hear you…saved my life yesterday,” he says. “It seems I owe you my thanks. So. Thank you.”

Anders takes it, masters his surprise. “You’re welcome. Good to see you’re up and about.”

There’s a brief silence. Fenris and Anders have just said nice things to each other, in a genuine fashion. The occasion is unprecedented, and the silence as a result extremely awkward. But Anders rescues them. “I like your new style, by the way. Going for a sort of stoat-lost-in-a-burlap-sack look?”

Hawke slaps his good hand to his chest in mock offense. “Are you calling my clothes a burlap sack?”

Fenris’s glare is fanged. “I owe you a debt of gratitude, mage, but do not take advantage of it.”

Hawke circles an arm around his waist, kisses him on the cheek. “It’s all right. I don’t think you look like a stoat.”

“I should hope—“

“More like an ermine, with that hair, wouldn’t you say?”

He’s hardly finished the sentence before Fenris has extracted himself from Hawke’s arm and gone to pour his own cup of tea. But from Anders there’s an outpouring of merry laughter, a sound so long unheard even Fenris starts and turns. Anders sips from his cup. “What? What is it?”

Hawke shakes his head. “Nothing. I’m glad you came by.”

In no time at all Anders and Fenris are sniping at each other once again, but it’s good-natured, companionable, rather than their normal vicious jabs. Hawke sits back and spectates, and pours Anders a second cup of tea. Bizarre to think that less than a day ago Fenris was a hair’s breadth away from death and Anders looked like a newly raised corpse drawn forward by an empty will. Now they’re both grinning, and as Hawke watches Fenris breaks out into laughter, wincing at his injuries but laughing anyway. Hawke didn’t know what he’d done to deserve the events of yesterday, and neither does he know what he’s done to deserve this, right now. But he’ll take it.  _Please let this last,_  he prays, hoping the Maker isn’t too busy to hear him.

_Please let this last._


End file.
